Within the last decade, the concept of emotional intelligence (EI) has come to gain
currency within practitioner literature relating to, among other areas, leadership, training,
workplace assessment, and human resource management. The concept has already begun
to inform practice within these and cognate fields. This article centrally examines the
sociological significance of EI as a nascent managerial discourse. Through developing a
three-way dialogue between the writers Richard Sennett, Daniel Goleman, and George
Ritzer, it is contended that EI can be understood to signal ‘new rules’ for work involving
demands for workers to develop moral character better attuned to the dynamics of the
flexible workplace — character which is more ‘intelligent’, adaptive, and reflexive.
Furthermore, it is argued that while EI appears in some important respects to open the
scope for worker discretion, when viewed in the context of recent debates about the
corporate colonisation of workers’ affects and subjectivities, it might also signal
diminished scope for worker resistance. However, ultimately, the case of EI is used to
problematise recent discussions of worker resistance — to suggest the possibility of
‘resistant’ worker agency exercised through collusion with, as well as transgression of,
corporate norms and practices.